Like July 4th, Thanksgiving is a big holiday in the produce business. Everyone in the country is eating the same things, on exactly the same day. Demand for those foods spikes for a single week. Turkey growers manage this problem by having the birds ready a month or more early and then freezing them.
But you can’t freeze fresh produce and thaw it out a month later. If you are growing lots of broccoli, celery, or other fresh produce for Turkeyday and they are ready too soon, or don’t mature in time, you are essentially SOL. Once the pre-year end holiday parties and shopping frenzy start, the average American shifts to a diet composed primarily of appetizers, desert and pumpkin-spice lattes. Vegetable consumption plummets.
The weather is inherently unpredictable here and in other places where fresh produce is grown in the fall. On our farm we have had everything from heat waves to floods to freezes to gale force winds — and sometimes more than one of those — the week before Thanksgiving.
This year, though, it’s been pretty darn nice. Cool but not cold, rainy but not super wet, and just enough sun to keep the vegetables growing. It’s been a nice change after a winter, spring and summer of extremes. Let’s hope it’s an indicator of the year to come and not just Mother Nature catching her breath before taking another swing.
Happy Thanksgiving to you and your loved ones and thanks for supporting our farm!
Pablito